WorldStarHipHop is a content-aggregating

video blog A video blog or video log, sometimes shortened to vlog (), is a form of blog for which the medium is video. Vlog entries often combine embedded video (or a video link) with supporting text, images, and other metadata. Entries can be recorded in ...

. Zurawik, David.
Worldstarhiphop.com makes a name for itself with shocking viral videos
". ''

The Baltimore Sun ''The Baltimore Sun'' is the largest general-circulation daily newspaper based in the U.S. state of Maryland and provides coverage of local and regional news, events, issues, people, and industries. Founded in 1837, it is currently owned by T ...

''. March 23, 2012. Retrieved on April 22, 2012
Alternate
link to the same article from the ''

Orlando Sentinel The ''Orlando Sentinel'' is the primary newspaper of Orlando, Florida, and the Central Florida region. It was founded in 1876 and is currently owned by Tribune Publishing Company. The ''Orlando Sentinel'' is owned by parent company, '' Tribune P ...

''. "World Star is just basically shock video," said Nsenga Burton, an associate professor at Goucher College and editor-at-large for the African-American-focused website The Root. "They comb the pop cultural landscape for videos that are shocking on multiple levels and feed into peoples' voyeuristic tendencies." Founded in 2005, the site averages 1.2 million unique visitors a day. The site, operated by Worldstar, LLC,Granick, Jennifer.
New Year, New Job
". The Center for Internet and Society.

Stanford Law School Stanford Law School (Stanford Law or SLS) is the law school of Stanford University, a private research university near Palo Alto, California. Established in 1893, it is regarded as one of the most prestigious law schools in the world. Stanford La ...

. January 9, 2012. Retrieved on November 30, 2012. was founded by Lee "Q" O'Denat, a

Hollis, Queens Hollis is a residential middle-class neighborhood within the southeastern section of the New York City borough of Queens. While a predominantly African-American community, there are small minorities of Hispanics and South Asians residing in the ...

–based hip-hop fan who attended Grover Cleveland High School before graduating.Jacobson, Mark. "World Star, Baby!" '' New York''. February 5, 2012
2
. Retrieved on November 2, 2012. Also available at

General OneFile InfoTrac is a family of full-text databases of content from academic journals and general magazines, of which the majority are targeted to the English-speaking North American market. As is typical of online proprietary databases, various forms ...

. Described by ''

Vibe ''Vibe'' is an American music and entertainment magazine founded by producers David Salzman and Quincy Jones. The publication predominantly features R&B and hip hop music artists, actors and other entertainers. After shutting down producti ...

'' as a "remnant of the

Geocities Yahoo! GeoCities was a web hosting service that allowed users to create and publish websites for free and to browse user-created websites by their theme or interest. GeoCities was started in November 1994 by David Bohnett and John Rezner, and ...

generation", the site regularly features shocking events caught on video, music videos and assorted content targeted to young audiences. O'Denat who referred to himself as a " Haitian ghetto nerd",Jacobson, Mark. "WorldStar, Baby!" ''

New York Magazine ''New York'' is an American biweekly magazine concerned with life, culture, politics, and style generally, and with a particular emphasis on New York City. Founded by Milton Glaser and Clay Felker in 1968 as a competitor to ''The New Yorker' ...

''. February 5, 2012
1
Retrieved on April 24, 2012. Also available at

. described WorldStarHipHop as the "

CNN CNN (Cable News Network) is a multinational cable news channel headquartered in Atlanta, Georgia, U.S. Founded in 1980 by American media proprietor Ted Turner and Reese Schonfeld as a 24-hour cable news channel, and presently owned by ...

of the

ghetto A ghetto, often called ''the'' ghetto, is a part of a city in which members of a minority group live, especially as a result of political, social, legal, environmental or economic pressure. Ghettos are often known for being more impoverished t ...

".Milo, Peter V.
'CNN Of The Ghetto': WorldStarHipHop Becoming YouTube for Urban Violence
". CBS News. March 29, 2012. Retrieved on April 23, 2012. Lee "Q" O'Denat started the website in August 2005 with Ari Armani as a distributor of mixtapes. Shortly after the website's launch, hackers destroyed the website. O'Denat later restarted it as a content aggregator. Thereon, WorldStar focused on hip hop beefs which were previously popular through "street DVDs" such as ''Smack'', ''The Come Up'' and others. O'Denat used the setup of OnSmash.com, a website which had already been distributing similar material. O'Denat said that this led to tension between the two websites. He added "Once we went 100 percent video, showing that original hood stuff, we prevailed." The

P. Diddy Sean Combs (born Sean John Combs; November 4, 1969), also known by his stage names Puff Daddy, P. Diddy, Puffy, or Diddy, is an American rapper, actor, record producer, and record executive. Born in New York City, he worked as a talent directo ...

promotional video of

Cîroc Cîroc is a brand of alcoholic beverages produced in France since 2003 and distributed by the British-based multinational alcoholic beverage maker Diageo. The brand family includes vodka, flavored products containing vodka, and brandy. Since ...

vodka premiered on WorldStar. By 2012,

BET Black Entertainment Television (acronym BET) is an American basic cable channel targeting African-American audiences. It is owned by the CBS Entertainment Group unit of Paramount Global via BET Networks and has offices in New York City, Los ...

had voted WorldStarHipHop as the "top hip hop and urban culture website" for three years in a row. On August 5, 2014, ''

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'' reported that Paramount was working on a film based on the site with Russell Simmons expected to produce the film.

Initial launch

The website first became infamous for posting

shock Shock may refer to: Common uses Collective noun *Shock, a historic commercial term for a group of 60, see English numerals#Special names * Stook, or shock of grain, stacked sheaves Healthcare * Shock (circulatory), circulatory medical emergen ...

videos; however, today it focuses primarily on music. Many of the early videos of shocking events had gone viral. "The site's popularity has created a sort of voyeuristic feedback loop, in which disassociated bystanders immediately videotape shocking incidents and act as if they're already watching a video on the Internet". Jeff Himmelman of ''

The New York Times ''The New York Times'' (''the Times'', ''NYT'', or the Gray Lady) is a daily newspaper based in New York City with a worldwide readership reported in 2020 to comprise a declining 840,000 paid print subscribers, and a growing 6 million paid d ...

'' stated in 2013 that the website "does many things but mostly hosts videos of fights." David Zurawik of ''

'' said in 2012 that "Now in its sixth year, WorldStar is seen by many critics as yet another example of the coarsening of U.S. culture and life—another low on a downward continuum that extends from the

Jerry Springer Gerald Norman Springer (born February 13, 1944) is a British-American broadcaster, journalist, actor, producer, former lawyer, and politician. He hosted the tabloid talk show '' Jerry Springer'' between September 30, 1991 and July 26, 2018, an ...

-style trash-talk shows of the 1980s and 1990s through to the TMZ.com and

RadarOnline Radar Online is an American entertainment and gossip website that was first published as a print and online publication in September 2003 before becoming exclusively online. As of 2008, the magazine has been owned by the publisher American Media ...

websites of today." Some media observers argued that, in the words of Zurawik, "because of its African-American identity, it has the potential to be used by some viewers to create or fuel stereotypes of urban America as an out-of-control, chaotic space dominated by young, violent, African-American men." Nsenga Burton, the editor at large of ''

The Root "The Root" is a song by American recording artist D'Angelo. It is the eighth track on his second studio album, ''Voodoo'', which was released on January 25, 2000, by Virgin Records. "The Root" was recorded and produced by D'Angelo at New York's ...

'' and an associate professor at

Goucher College Goucher College ( ') is a private liberal arts college in Towson, Maryland. It was chartered in 1885 by a conference in Baltimore led by namesake John F. Goucher and local leaders of the Methodist Episcopal Church.https://archive.org/details/h ...

, described the site as "basically shock video. They comb the pop cultural landscape for videos that are shocking on multiple levels and feed into peoples' voyeuristic tendencies." In some videos of violent fights, people chant "World Star" in recognition that the video may be posted on the website. One 2012 video, showing an

Elyria, Ohio Elyria ( ) is a city in the Greater Cleveland metropolitan statistical area and the county seat of Lorain County, Ohio, Lorain County, Ohio, United States, located at the forks of the Black River (Ohio), Black River in Northeast Ohio 23 miles sou ...

(

Greater Cleveland The Cleveland metropolitan area, or Greater Cleveland as it is more commonly known, is the metropolitan area surrounding the city of Cleveland in Northeast Ohio, United States. According to the 2020 United States Census results, the five-county ...

) woman, Tashay D. Edwards, beating another woman, went viral. Edwards became so well known that it trended on

Twitter Twitter is an online social media and social networking service owned and operated by American company Twitter, Inc., on which users post and interact with 280-character-long messages known as "tweets". Registered users can post, like, and ...

along with the name "WorldStarHipHop". The video received about one million views in a single day.

Death of Denat

On January 23, 2017, founder and CEO Lee "Q" O'Denat died of

atherosclerotic cardiovascular disease Coronary artery disease (CAD), also called coronary heart disease (CHD), ischemic heart disease (IHD), myocardial ischemia, or simply heart disease, involves the reduction of blood flow to the heart muscle due to build-up of atherosclerotic pla ...

at the age of 43, with morbid obesity as a contributing factor.

Controversies

Bill O'Reilly attacked WorldStarHipHop and its president after watching a video of a kid talking about his plans to kill then-president

George W. Bush George Walker Bush (born July 6, 1946) is an American politician who served as the 43rd president of the United States from 2001 to 2009. A member of the Republican Party, Bush family, and son of the 41st president George H. W. Bush, he ...

. O'Reilly said, "I believe the Secret Service should arrest the parents of this kid and the purveyor of the website (Q)", calling it a "crime" that this was allowed up after the video was banned on other sites. WorldStarHipHop has been in cases involving lawsuits for

copyright infringement Copyright infringement (at times referred to as piracy) is the use of works protected by copyright without permission for a usage where such permission is required, thereby infringing certain exclusive rights granted to the copyright holder, s ...

. In one case, ''Scott v. WorldStarHipHop'', a video surfaced of a fight between a man (Scott) and his current and former girlfriend. The video was recorded by a Mr. Seymour and posted to the site. WSHH names the video "Disgraceful: College Fight In NYC Breaks Out Between A Guy, His Girl & Another Girl In Class! (Man Strong Arm's icThe Student. Hitting Her With Body Shots)." Shortly after the video was posted Scott was given copyright to the video by Mr. Seymour. He filed for a takedown notice so that WSHH would take down the video. He explained that WS did not have his permission to put up the video of the fight. Rapper 50 Cent (Curtis Jackson) also sued WorldStarHipHop in 2009 for using his image on their site without his permission. Jackson claimed that WorldStar and O'Denat used his images on the website which led people to believe that he was one of the owners of the site. He explained that O'Denat tarnished his image by having his image up on the site without his permission. After a five-year battle, Jackson finally won the case against WorldStar.

References

External links

* {{Hip hop websites 2005 establishments in the United States African-American-related controversies African-American blogs American news websites Black-owned companies of the United States Haitian-American history Hip hop websites Internet properties established in 2005 Shock sites Video blogs

Initial launch

Death of Denat

Controversies

References

Further reading

External links